FACULTY

	EJ Chichilnisky, A.B, M.S., Ph.D. Associate Professor, Systems Neurobiology Secondary Appointments: Adjunct Associate Professor, Department of Neuroscience, UCSD The Salk Institute 10010 North Torrey Pines Rd. La Jolla, CA 92037 office tel: 858-453-4100 x1286 Fax: 858-455-7933 Email: chichilnisky@salk.edu Lab Website: http://chichilnisky.salk.edu/
CV
Research Title
Ensemble coding of visual information in the primate retina
Research Description
The goal of our research is to understand how neural processing in the retina contributes to visual perception. We exploit unique 512-electrode recordings from the primate retina to examine how the visual scene is encoded by the electrical activity in hundreds of retinal ganglion cells (RGCs) of several distinct types. Some questions under active investigation include: How do spatio-temporal patterns of activity in many RGCs signal visual motion to the brain? Does synchronized firing in RGCs influence the encoding of visual information? How is color information processed and represented in RGCs? How reliably can visual stimuli be inferred from RGC activity? How do the receptive fields of different RGC types sample the visual scene? Can the population activity of many RGCs be understood with simple models? Can visual responses of RGCs be reproduced by electrical stimulation? With these studies we aim to elucidate the nature of population encoding at the first major stage of visual processing. We also hope that our investigation of electrical stimulation will contribute to the development of prosthetic devices for the visually impaired.
Recent Publications
Pillow JW, Shlens J, Paninski L, Sher A, Litke AM, Chichilnisky EJ & Simoncelli EP (2008). Spatio-temporal correlations and visual signalling in a complete neuronal population. Nature 454:995-9 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18650810 Sekirnjak C, Hottowy P, Sher A, Dabrowski W, Litke AM, & Chichilnisky EJ (2008) High-resolution electrical stimulation of primate retina for epiretinal implant design. Journal of Neuroscience 28:4446-4456. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18434523 Sekirnjak C, Hottowy P, Sher A, Dabrowski W, Litke AM & Chichilnisky EJ (2007). Electrical stimulation of mammalian retinal ganglion cells using dense arrays of small-diameter electrodes. In: Artificial Sight; Springer Series Biological and Medical Physics/Biomedical Engineering, edited by Humayun MS, Weiland JD, Chader G & Greenbaum E. Springer (New York). pp 333-345. Field GD, Sher A, Gauthier JL, Greschner M, Shlens J, Litke AM, & Chichilnisky EJ (2007) Spatial properties and functional organization of small bistratified ganglion cells in primate retina. Journal of Neuroscience 27(48):13261-13272. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18045920 Petrusca D, Grivich MI, Sher A, Field GD, Gauthier JL, Greschner M, Shlens J, Chichilnisky EJ, & Litke AM (2007) Identification and characterization of a Y-like primate retinal ganglion cell type. Journal of Neuroscience 27(41):11019-11027. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17928443 Field GD & Chichilnisky EJ (2007) Information processing in the primate retina: Circuitry and coding. Annnual Review of Neuroscience 30:1-30. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17335403 Shlens J, Kennel MB, Abarbanel HDI & Chichilnisky EJ (2007) Estimating information rates with confidence intervals in neural spike trains. Neural Computation 19(7):1683-1719. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17521276 Horwitz GD, Chichilnisky EJ & Albright TD (2007) Cone inputs to simple and complex cells in V1 of awake macaque. Journal of Neurophysiology 97(4):3070-3081. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17303812 Shlens J, Field GD, Gauthier JL, Grivich MI, Petrusca D, Sher A, Litke AM, & Chichilnisky EJ (2006) The structure of multi-neuron firing patterns in primate retina. Journal of Neuroscience 26(32):8254-8266. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16899720 Sekirnjak C, Hottowy P, Sher A, Dabrowski W, Litke AM, & Chichilnisky EJ (2006) Electrical stimulation of mammalian retinal ganglion cells with multi-electrode arrays. Journal of Neurophysiology 95:3311-3327. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16436479 Pillow JW, Paninski L, Uzzell VJ, Simoncelli EP, & Chichilnisky EJ (2005) Prediction and decoding of retinal ganglion cell responses with a probabilistic spiking model. Journal of Neuroscience 25(47):11003-11013. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16306413 Frechette ES, Sher A, Grivich MI, Petrusca D, Litke AM, & Chichilnisky EJ (2005) Fidelity of the ensemble code for visual motion in primate retina. Journal of Neurophysiology 94(1):119-135. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15625091 Chichilnisky EJ & Rieke F (2005) Detection sensitivity and temporal resolution of visual signals near absolute threshold in the salamander retina. Journal of Neuroscience 25(2):313-330. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15647475 Kennel MB, Shlens J, Abarbanel HDI & Chichilnisky EJ (2005) Estimating entropy rates with Bayesian confidence intervals. Neural Computation 17(7):1531-76. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15901407 Horwitz GD, Chichilnisky EJ & Albright TD (2005) Blue-Yellow signals are enhanced by spatiotemporal luminance contrast in macaque V1. Journal of Neurophysiology 93(4):2263-78. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15496484 Uzzell VJ & Chichilnisky EJ (2004) Precision of spike trains in primate retinal ganglion cells. Journal of Neurophysiology 92:780-789. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15277596 Litke AM, Bezayiff N, Chichilnisky EJ, Cunningham W, Dabrowski W, Grillo AA, Grivich M, Grybos P, Hottowy P, Kachiguine S, Kalmar RS, Mathieson K, Petrusca D, Rahman M & Sher A (2004) What does the eye tell the brain? Development of a system for the large scale recording of retinal output activity. IEEE Transactions on Nuclear Science 51(4):1434-1440 http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/xpl/freeabs_all.jsp?isnumber=29304&arnumber=1323709&count=100&index=20 Chichilnisky EJ & Kalmar RS (2003) Temporal resolution of ensemble visual motion signals in primate retina. Journal of Neuroscience 23(17):6681-6689. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12890760 Chichilnisky EJ & Kalmar RS (2002) Functional asymmetries in ON and OFF ganglion cells of primate retina. Journal of Neuroscience 22(7):2737-47. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11923439 Schwartz O, Chichilnisky EJ & Simoncelli EP (2002) Characterizing neural gain control using spike-triggered covariance. Neural Information Processing Systems 14:269-276. http://chichilnisky.salk.edu/publications/Schwartz2002.html Chander D & Chichilnisky EJ (2001) Adaptation to temporal contrast in primate and salamander retina. Journal of Neuroscience 21(24):9904-16. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11739598 Chichilnisky EJ (2001) A simple white noise analysis of neuronal light responses. Network 12(2):199-213. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11405422 Field GD, Greschner M, Gauthier JL, Rangel C, Shlens J, Sher A, Marshak DW, Litke AM, & Chichilnisky EJ (2009). High sensitivity rod photoreceptor input to blue-yellow color opponent pathway in primate retina. Nature Neuroscience 12:1159. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19668201 Shlens J, Field GD, Gauthier JL, Greschner M, Sher A, Litke AM, & Chichilnisky EJ (2009) The structure of large-scale synchronized firing in primate retina. Journal of Neuroscience 29:5022-5031. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19369571 Gauthier JL, Field GD, Sher A, Greschner M, Shlens J, Litke AM, & Chichilnisky EJ (2009) Receptive fields in primate retina are coordinated to sample visual space more uniformly. PLoS Biology, 2009; 7:1. e63 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pbio.1000063 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19355787 Gauthier JL, Field GD, Sher A, Shlens J, Greschner M, Litke AM, & Chichilnisky EJ (2009) Uniform signal redundancy of parasol and midget ganglion cells in primate retina. Journal of Neuroscience 29:4675-4680. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19357292 Shlens J, Rieke FM & Chichilnisky EJ (2008). Synchronized firing in the retina. Current Opinion in Neurobiology 18:1-7 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18832034

Page last updated: July 14, 2009

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